by James Somers
“I’m pretty sure I would have remembered that conversation,” I replied.
“Well, Lycean was not the only one preparing for a war among the Descendant clans.”
“Where is the warehouse located?”
“The other side of London, but I have established portal links with a lot of places,” he said.
“How did you manage it?” I asked. “Wouldn’t that put a constant drain upon you?”
A flourish of his left hand produced his ebony cane topped with the silver wolf’s head. “I connected them to an object of power.”
I smiled when I saw it, knowing that I possessed its twin. I copied his flourish and produced Malak-esh. Oliver’s eyes lit up when he saw it—even doing a double take for a moment between my Angel Fire and his own.
“Ah, there is a slight difference,” he said, noticing the lion’s head for the first time. “I do believe you’ve left out some of the details about what happened in my absence.”
“Blame Donatus for having us choose weapons for our group,” I said. “Nothing seemed to call to me except the alloy bar down in one of the forges.”
Oliver nodded thoughtfully. “And who else should it call to but my own brother? I’m happy to know it came into the right hands at last.”
A wave of Oliver’s cane opened a portal into one of his warehouses. Crates were stacked nearly to the ceiling in the building on the other side of London.
“Carry them over,” Oliver said.
I took a few steps toward the portal before he stopped me.
“I meant the way Helios instructed you,” he said.
“Of course,” I replied.
I concentrated on the crates with my mind, picking out the stacks that were clearly labeled TNT. One by one, the wooden crates lifted off of the ground and floated through the portal window into the Crystal Cathedral where we were standing. A parade of explosives was soon in full progress from Oliver’s warehouse, arranging themselves according to my thoughts in several long rows extending the length of the building.
In all, one hundreds crates full of dynamite had been gathered to the Crystal Cathedral. Oliver allowed the portal to close in upon itself, and we surveyed our handiwork.
“It’s a beautiful building,” I said. “Seems a shame to destroy it.”
“If London had not become a dead city, I wouldn’t even consider it,” Oliver said.
He drew the form of a mercurial sword out of his wolf’s head cane, holding it out from his body toward one of the crates. A flame came upon the blade, and Oliver began walking the length of the building. He touched his flaming sword to each crate along the way. I followed. By the time we had reached the end. Most of the crates were enveloped in a blaze.
“Time to go,” I said, grabbing Oliver’s arm.
A moment later we were standing by the carriage again—this time by my will. The first crate explode several hundred yards away within the Crystal Cathedral. The rest went up in rapid succession like falling dominos.
From one end to the other, glass exploded into the sky, showering us and all of Hyde Park in razor sharp shards. At the first horrendous boom, I had thrown up my extension in order to protect Oliver and myself. Thankfully, I had. Shards of glass sank into the ground around us like a hail of arrows fired across a medieval battlefield.
Hearing the agitation of Lewis and Clark, still hitched to the carriage behind us, I turned, expecting to find them both mortally wounded. However, Oliver had protected them as I had done for us. The carriage, unfortunately, had not faired so well. The black Town Coach had been peppered by flying debris to the point of needing a complete sanding and paint job.
I was amazed that Lewis and Clark had not bolted at the first explosion. They looked as though they would have enjoyed nothing better at the moment than to race out of Hyde Park. But I assumed Oliver had kept them from it somehow.
As the plumes of fire began to recede a little, I saw what had become of the cast iron structure of the building. The plate glass panes had given way to the pressure exerted by the exploding dynamite very quickly, allowing the somewhat fractured skeleton of the Crystal Cathedral to remain intact. Fires burned within, consuming the furnishings, inner walls and what was left of the wooden crates. A pillar of blackish smoke rose above it all, signaling fresh chaos in London to anyone who might be available to see it.
Oliver and I reentered our carriage, dumping the seat cushions full of glass out onto the road. Now, we waited. I had kept the glamour on the Town Coach and horses, so if anyone showed up to investigate the wreckage of the cathedral building we would not be seen.
Nearly twenty minutes later, we were still watching out through the coach windows. Nothing had happened, yet. No one had arrived on the scene to see what we had done. I began to wonder if London wasn’t completely devoid of life when Oliver took in a sharp breath.
“What is it?” I tried to mutter, but Oliver grabbed my arm quickly, trying to silence me.
I didn’t understand. After all, I had rendered us both silent and invisible to others. He motioned with his index and middle fingers to his eyes and then out the carriage window toward the lawn between us and the cathedral building. I followed his line of sight, but saw nothing—only the snow-covered lawn, partially melted by the heat of the explosion.
Remembering our experience with the Wood Elves, I refined my vision, looking for the details most people overlook. A horde of crawling pixies sprang into sharp focus on the lawn. The heat rolling off of the building had masked their movements, rendering them as nothing more than wavy refractions of firelight on the snow.
I jumped back immediately, shaking the carriage and startling the horses. My recent experience with the pixies still terrified me. From what I had seen, these little beasts were crawling by the hundreds straight for us. How had they spotted us?
“Go!” Oliver yelled.
It took me a moment to realize he had been speaking to Lewis and Clark. The stallions hadn’t misunderstood him at all. They could see the pixies as well as anyone and were more than ready to be off.
The carriage lurched suddenly, throwing me against my bench seat hard enough to leave bruises. The stallions were going for broke, heading back into the city. I was still wondering if we had really been seen by the pixies when I heard their war cries echoing across the field behind us.
“How?” I asked Oliver as the carriage bounced and shook beneath us.
“Pixies can see through all but the most powerful glamours,” he said. “They might seem like an insignificant bunch of barbarians, but their senses are as keen as they come. They probably saw our body heat and smelled the horses, also.”
I felt like I might start hyperventilating at any moment. The last thing I wanted was to end up in the hands of the pixies again. Death seemed a more tolerable fate than being slowly eaten alive by those fiends.
“What worries me more is that they’re in London in such large numbers,” Oliver said, continuing his thought. “They usually only conduct night raids here and there in the mortal world. They’re opportunists and pirates, not a standing army that invades cities.”
“Surely we can outrun them,” I said.
“If those are the only ones, certainly,” Oliver answered. “There may be more in the city.”
“I’ll open a portal right now then,” I said, preparing to do exactly that, posthaste.
“Bit of a problem there, I’m afraid,” Oliver replied. “Pixies are quite adept at canceling out portal structures. They have a knack for disrupting them. Other than angels, they are the only Descendants I know who can do it so well. I can feel the resistance already on the spiritual plane.”
“They can cancel out portals?” I shouted. “You never told me that could happen.”
Oliver shot me an annoyed look. “You never asked, did you?”
I honestly wanted to choke him, then and there, but we had more pressing matters to attend to at the moment. Having come back into the city, running again on cobbled lanes,
I noticed pixies running from dilapidated buildings like bees from a broken hive. Even more were coming out of the sewerage system.
“Oh dear,” Oliver said, observing what I had seen. “I wondered if that wouldn’t be the case.”
He was taking the whole situation with much more ease than I was. We couldn’t escape by portal, and they could see through our glamour. Not to mention, they outnumbered us by thousands. To say that I was on the verge of a heart attack would not have been a stretch of the imagination, but Oliver seemed merely peeved.
“What can we do?” I pleaded.
He was thinking, but I was too impatient for a way out of this situation. I could already feel the knives being drawn across my flesh again, the searing pain of pronged forks jabbed into my body. I wasn’t going back to a state of paralysis, wanting to scream and not being able to utter a syllable. I would rather die. Still, I much preferred that they die first.
I leaned out the carriage window, looking back on the road as pixies launched themselves from the sewers and from darkened buildings. I reached for one of the nearer buildings, a tenement by the looks of it, that looked ready to topple over all on its own. I drew upon my fear and anger and then pulled upon the structure with my mind.
Feeling resistance to my will, I searched for weak points, destroyed them first and then pulled even harder. Lacking proper support now, the tenement surrendered quickly to my demands. The building toppled over onto the pavement, crushing the nearest wave of pixies. A smoldering mound of rubble was left in our wake, providing a large obstacle to those coming up from behind the others.
But the pixies remained undaunted. They leaped about the debris and many were soon past it, continuing their pursuit as they called for reinforcements from those still ahead of us. Lewis and Clark were still racing through the streets trying to get as far away from the pixie horde as possible. As some of our pursuers popped up from the sewers into the road, the horses fiercely trampled them down, pummeling others with the churning wheels and bounding body of the Town Coach.
I had wondered what Oliver would think of my desperate destruction of London properties. To my surprise, he had already resorted to the same tactic, only with more daring. Oliver pulled upon one of the buildings ahead of us on the other side of the road. Support beams fractured and gave way as the entire structure leaned toward the road.
We wouldn’t make it before the building came down on top of us. I knew we were about to die, but I couldn’t take my eyes off of the building as it overshadowed our carriage. Still, Lewis and Clark had no intentions on being crushed. I wouldn’t have thought it possible, but they sped up even more, frothing at their mouths, desperately trying to get beyond this danger.
Our Town Coach slipped beneath the building, with only a peppering of light debris, before the rest came down onto Piccadilly with a thunderous boom. Pixie screams were silenced instantly beneath a mountain of rubble scattering across the road and into other buildings, toppling some of them in a calamitous chain of destruction.
A cloud of dust and billowing snow filled the street behind us, hiding the details. I saw no more pixies following. Either they had given up, or had been crushed. I didn’t care which. My relief was palpable. I sat back on the hard bench, staring at Oliver. He appeared winded, but just as relieved as I was.
I didn’t bother to ask where we were headed now. Truth be told, I didn’t care, as long as it wasn’t back into downtown London. The city was worse than dead. It was occupied not by vampires, or Lycans, but vile pixies. They owned the jewel of the British Empire now. As far as I was concerned, they could have it.
Oliver leaned forward. The battered carriage vibrated uncertainly around us. Much more punishment would surely see it fly to pieces on the road. Still, Lewis and Clark kept their frantic pace, disregarding mounting fatigue. There was no time to rest, yet.
“We must go to Xandrea,” he said.
“To find the others?”
He nodded.
“As much fun as this was, I could have skipped our little brush with death and gone to Xandrea first,” I quipped.
“London has been my home for many years,” he said. “I’m sorry to put you through that, but I wanted to know what had become of her.” He sighed heavily. “Now, I wish I didn’t know.”
“The others might still be in Xandrea,” I offered. “It’s a safe haven.”
“Perhaps,” he said. “War can change the landscape quickly. I wasn’t expecting what we found in the city. There’s no telling what has happened in our absence. It’s a sure bet that our enemies have not been idle.”
“If my dealings with Grayson Stone are any indication, I’m sure of it,” I said. “He definitely intends on carrying out his father’s plans for conquest.”
“Be prepared, Brody,” Oliver warned. “Grayson Stone may have to be our next stop, after we visit Donatus in Xandrea.”
I didn’t answer that statement. Somehow, I had already known stopping Stone would be central to ending this war. He was a slippery and powerful force working persuasively among humans and Descendants alike. Still, having Oliver back in the world, made almost any endeavor seem possible. We would do whatever we had to do, even face the son of Lucifer.
*Bonus Preview of “REVENANT” following*
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DESCENDANTS SAGA BOOK THREE
Coming Summer 2013
Himself
Arthur Craven sat upon his bed inside the Ambassador Hotel in Philadelphia, staring at his suitcase. The leather bound case did not match the heavy steamer trunk setting near the wardrobe, but it was big enough to house the particular item of power he never left behind. It was this item that had Arthur on edge of late.
He had ever been the faithful worshipper while acting as the head of the Order of Light in London. However, since the Order had been destroyed by a troll attack during their meeting with Lord Grayson Stone, Arthur had not prayed once. The golden idol, which had resided for years within a secret chamber in his home, had been packed away with his other belongings, but he had not offered incense after that fateful meeting.
Sitting in this American hotel, he longed to open the case and make his penance to his master, Lord Natas, but fear kept him still. Arthur knew that his master was likely furious with him. He had ran from the doomed meeting of the Order of Light, never looking back, or even attempting to contact Lord Stone to see if all was well. He had failed.
Still, there was a small hope that his services might be required. His abilities as a magician had disappeared with his courage that day, and he desired to feel his master’s powerful presence again. Like an opium addict, he longed for the comforting embrace that freed him from his mundane existence as a mortal man. He had to chance his master’s fury.
While he watched, the two latches on the leather case unfastened themselves. Arthur gasped when the suitcase lid flew open, revealing the seven heads of the golden dragon. Its fourteen emerald eyes flashed, and Arthur knew his master was in the room somewhere.
He leaped from his perch on the side of the bed to the floor where he prostrated himself. “Lord Natas, I beg your forgiveness,” he said frantically. “Please allow me to live, so that I may serve you with this frail body.”
Arthur had been found, caught on the run all the way across the Atlantic. There was no escaping Lord Natas. He kicked himself mentally for his reluctance to make amends earlier. Why had he not done the right thing before now?
The hotel room vibrated like a railway station with a heavy locomotive barreling through at full speed. The gas lamps dimmed, a
nd the air sparked at random with static electricity. Arthur wondered if the arrival of his master meant his doom at long last.
The room door slowly opened on its own. The hall beyond was empty. The door closed again. There were no footsteps into the room. Arthur wasn’t sure what to think.
“Arthur Craven,” his master’s voice boomed within the room.
“I am here, my lord,” he responded. “What is thy bidding?”
“For your cowardice in London, I should burn you to ash,” the voice threatened.
Arthur prepared for the worst, quivering with fear upon the floor. There would be no running from his master. He could not get away no matter where he fled.
“However, I will pardon your transgression in London on one condition,” Lord Natas said.
“Anything, my lord,” Arthur replied.
“You will bind your mortal life to the will of my son, Grayson Stone.”
Arthur raised himself from the floor, finding Lord Stone already in the room with him.
“My lord, I had not realized you were in America,” Arthur said.
“My father has plans for this nation,” Grayson said. “You can be a part of those plans, if you will now obey.”
Arthur remained on his knees before Grayson. “I will indeed, my lord,” he said. “Thank you for pardoning my transgression.”
Grayson laid his palm upon Arthur’s forehead, exerting his power upon the man. However, in this case, he did not take his life. Since Arthur was consenting, he drew upon his life force, binding the mortal man to him. At the same time he became a portal through which Lucifer could bring one of his own out of the prison of Tartarus.
The process had been explained to Grayson already, though admittedly it was complex. Grayson was blood-bonded to Lucifer as his son. In turn, Lucifer was spiritually linked to his kindred, the Fallen, many of whom resided in Tartarus as prisoners of the Almighty.
However, while they were still imprisoned in their natural forms, they could extend themselves to the mortal plane, if they had a means. Lucifer had concocted a means for them, as well as providing physical bodies they could utilize. Arthur would be the first.
